Light Reading
US fiber rollouts reach tipping point but are still far behind hybrid fiber-coaxial
Fiber network deployments have reached a milestone as they now pass more than 50% of US households, according to recent data from the Fiber Broadband Association and RVA Market Research and Consulting. Almost 69 million of those locations are "unique" fiber homes, meaning that about 9 million are passed by more than one fiber provider. The share of broadband technology is also evolving. While hybrid fiber-coaxial (HFC) remains the primary way of delivering broadband, fiber-to-the-premises (FTTP) and fixed wireless access (FWA) will continue to make their presence felt in the coming years.
Podcast | How Vermont is tackling three main barriers to broadband adoption
Like all states and territories, Vermont has been hard at work developing plans for the NTIA's Broadband Equity Access and Deployment (BEAD) grant program; and the companion Digital Equity program.
5G spectrum debate heats up ahead of Biden's implementation plan
Spectrum is a hot topic in Washington these days, as lawmakers, lobbyists, regulators and others look for advantage ahead of the release of an implementation plan for the Biden administration's national spectrum strategy. The latest: A new bill from two top Republican Senators would require the government to reallocate at least 600MHz of midband spectrum for commercial use within three years.
ACP funding extension not dead, but odds are 'low' – Blair Levin
While there's still a chance that funding for the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP) will be extended beyond April, one top policy expert fears that a successful extension faces an "uphill struggle." That was the assessment of New Street Research Policy Analyst Blair Levin, who shared his latest thoughts on the perils of the program in a research note. A pressing issue, he points out, is that ACP was not woven into Congress's latest budget package.
End of ACP like a 'promotional roll-off,' Comcast CFO says
With the end of the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP) increasingly likely if Congress does not quickly step in with more funding, broadband operators are adjusting their game plans to continue to serve customers who have been benefiting from the program. Comcast, which has about 1.4 million customers on ACP, is no different.
AT&T, T-Mobile and Verizon outline their FWA, fiber expansion plans
Each of the big telephone company operators in the US—Verizon, T-Mobile and AT&T—plans to expand the reach of its broadband home Internet service in the coming years. Further, each company plans to do so via a combination of fiber and fixed wireless access (FWA) connections. Those efforts could be supercharged if the operators tap into subsidies from the US government.
Internet service providers not required to list ACP on broadband labels—FCC
Service providers will not be required to list information related to the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP) on their broadband labels, according to guidance issued by the FCC's Wireline Competition Bureau (WCB) on Monday.
Cable and wireless lobbyists clash over the future of FWA
Lobbyists backed by the cable industry are working to prevent 5G providers from obtaining more spectrum in the lower 3GHz band.
Will telephone companies be the railroad tycoons of the AI age?
During America's Gilded Age, a handful of scrappy entrepreneurs built the nation's railway system and in the process created huge piles of money by controlling shipping and travel lanes across the country. Today, as AI hype begins consuming everything in sight, some are hinting that mobile network operators—and their equipment vendors—may be sitting in a similar position thanks to the data they own. After all, AI models are only as good as the data they're trained on.